Make Toddler Snacks a Learning Adventure

Many toddlers need to snack between meals since their stomachs are small and they may not eat enough at meals to stretch until the next meal. Snacks can contribute to a balanced diet by providing needed nutrients like calcium, vitamins, and fiber. The best snacks contain some protein (cheese, peanut butter, lunchmeat, milk) which stays in the stomach longer than grains or simple sugars (popsicles, juice). When snacks are a daily occurrence, caregivers can get weary of the same choices. Creating a theme for your snack choices can be fun for your children and yourself – and a learning experience. Preschools often focus on colors or shapes. How about having circle shaped snacks one week like Cheerios, round pretzels, green or red pepper slices, cucumber slices without the seeds, doughnuts or bagels. Another snack theme might focus on local foods, choosing snacks grown or produced in your community or county. This might require a trip to a local farmers’ market or outlet store. Your child might be too young to appreciate the value of supporting local vendors but would enjoy the field trip. Snacks might also center around the Nutrition Facts label, choosing snacks that include 2% calcium or labeled whole grain. Check the serving size and see how much your child is eating. The serving sizes are established for adults but give you a reference for making healthy choices. Many snacks are advertised to children with popular movie or TV characters. If the labels indicate that these are good choices, include these into your themes. While poor snack choices can lead to empty calories, overeating and missed meals, preplanned snacks in proper portion sizes can keep the day going and contribute to your child’s mental and physical development.

Mortgage Foreclosure Rescue Scams

Someone knocks on your door and represents himself as an attorney who can negotiate a deal with your lender to save your house. He hands you a business card with the name of the law firm. But before he can do anything to help you, you have to pay him a fee. This person knows your name, your lender, and the fact that your home is in danger of foreclosure. You’re unsure about this so you call the law firm at the number on the business card to verify it. The law firm thanks you for calling and says there has been someone going around the community misrepresenting themselves as being with the firm. But the “law firm” is in on the deal and text messages the fellow to call off the deal and leave. You were lucky. You were targeted for the scam, but managed to avoid it. The information the scammer used to make the deal seem believable is all available as a public record in foreclosure notices in newspapers, on the Internet, or at local government offices. This is known as the Phantom Help scheme, one of several types of scams going on to purportedly rescue desperate homeowners from mortgage foreclosure. In addition to paying the fee, you were told there was no need to contact your lender, lawyer, or credit counselor. The scammer will take care of all the details on your behalf. Just send the mortgage payments directly to him while he negotiates with the lender. That’s money you’ll never see again and neither will the lender. Bait and Switch. You’re told you’re signing documents for a new loan to make your mortgage current. In fact, you’ve surrendered the ownership of the house to the scammer in exchange for a “rescue” loan. Rent-to-Buy. If you surrender title to the house, you can stay there as a renter and buy it back in the next few years. Surrendering the title allows someone else with a better credit rating to secure new financing. The catch? The terms of these deals usually are so burdensome that buying it back becomes impossible. You lose the home and the scammer walks off with all or most of your home equity. Red Flags to watch for if you’re looking for foreclosure prevention help, avoid any business that:

• guarantees to stop the foreclosure process—no matter what your circumstances;
• instructs you not to contact your lender, lawyer, or credit or housing counselor;
• collects a fee before providing you with any services;
• accepts payment only by cashier’s check or wire transfer;
• encourages you to lease your home so you can buy it back over time;
• tells you to make your mortgage payments directly to it, rather than your lender; tells you to transfer your property deed or title to it;
• offers to buy your house for cash at a fixed price that is not set by the housing market at the time of sale;
• offers to fill out paperwork for you; or
• pressures you to sign paperwork you haven’t had a chance to read thoroughly or that you don’t understand.

Where to find help: If you are having difficulty making mortgage payments or have received a foreclosure notice, contact your mortgage servicer immediately or seek help with a mortgage counseling agency. In Pennsylvania, you may get help from the Homeowners Emergency Mortgage Assistance Program (HEMAP) http://www.phfa.org/consumers/homeowners/hemap.aspx. You can also find help at http://www.995hope.org Whatever you do, don’t wait until the last minute. For more information, go to:

• www.ftc.gov
• http://www.attorneygeneral.gov Look for the Consumer tab and choose Advisories.
• http://www.justice.gov/ust/eo/public_affairs/factsheet/docs/fs06.htm
• http://www.freddiemac.com/avoidfraud/fraud_schemes.html

Getting Dressed . . . By Myself!

When children become toddlers, they begin to develop a self-awareness and independence. All parents know this is when the word “no” enters the vocabulary! One of the ways that toddlers express their independence is through their ability to dress and undress themselves and to make clothing choices. Clothes are more important to young children than most people think. Comfortable clothes make a child feel confident and independent. They also help the child express their personality through color, style and texture. Toddlers love to undress themselves to demonstrate independence and usually start by removing socks, shoes, hats, coats and mittens. Of course by age two; they will probably master the art of undressing completely and streaking naked across the living room, usually when you have company! The dressing process is a little more complicated than undressing, but by age two most children are able to pull on simple clothing. You can assist by providing clothing that is easy to put on and take off such as shirts with stretchy necks and pants with elastic waists. These pull down pants will also help with toilet learning. With practice, the young child will get very accomplished with dressing but may still put clothing items on backwards or shoes on the wrong feet. It’s best if you use a teamwork approach and be on hand to help when needed so the toddler does not become too frustrated. You may find you need to unbuckle overalls or unbutton garments before the item can be pulled on. It is hard for little hands to manage buttons, zippers and other small fasteners. Another way you can help is to lay out the clothing in the order that it should be put on. You can point out that the tag goes in the back or the elephant design goes in the front. This is a great time to work on other skills such as colors and the parts of the body (the RED shoes go on your FEET). You can practice giving simple instructions to the child such as “pull the shirt over your head”, “put your arms in the armholes”, and then “pull the shirt down”. Don’t make it too complicated. This whole learning process of getting dressed lasts from about 18 months to four years. Most children are four or five before they can tie their shoes or button shirts correctly. Surviving this developmental stage is a balancing act for parents; if you don’t let them do it or if you interfere too much, the child gets frustrated. But if you don’t help at all, he may never finish dressing and will also end up frustrated. One of the most annoying parts of having preschoolers dress themselves is that it takes so much time! They have a poor sense of time and don’t understand what it means to be in a hurry. They are not dawdling to make you angry; it is just a normal developmental stage. Try to schedule extra time for dressing so the activity doesn’t end in an angry outburst. A huge source of conflict in children dressing themselves is over what the child is going to wear. I am in favor of letting a child make decisions in this area, but by all means you need to limit the choices or you will never make it out of the house! Ask “do you want to wear the blue shirt or the red one” instead of “what shirt do you want to wear?” As children get older and insist on selecting their outfits, things get even more interesting. We have all seen children in the grocery store wearing a bathing suit, boots and a scarf around the neck and smiled to ourselves when we guessed who picked the ensemble that day! Unless the clothing is inappropriate for the weather or occasion, let your child have a little freedom of expression. And of course take a photo to show them when he or she is a teenager! I think it is this conflict over what the child wears that distresses parents most. We all think the people who see our child in multi-colored, mismatched clothing will judge us as parents. Relax and consider that all parents face this “opportunity to teach”. Remember that in the long run, having a child who has learned to make decisions and act independently is much more important than having a child with a stylish, coordinated outfit!